How to Make Beef Tallow From Your Brisket Trimmings (2024)

FAQs

How do you render brisket trimmings into tallow? ›

Place the fat into your pan, then add enough water to cover the bottom of the pan by about half an inch. Place the pan over a medium flame, until the water starts to boil, then turn heat down to low. Cook gently for 1-2 hours, stirring every so often until most of the fat has rendered.

Brisket fat trimmings have multiple uses. You can use them to make beef tallow, hamburger meat, homemade sausages, and Yorkshire pudding. You can also use them as meat moisturizer when smoking brisket.

Render The Tallow

Render the fat for about 4 hours at 225-250°F. If using your kitchen oven, place the fat into an uncovered Dutch oven and away you go! If using the Weber Smokey Mountain Cooker, cook your brisket on the top cooking grate and render the fat scraps in a disposable foil pan on the bottom cooking grate.

Continue Cooking

The meat still needs a couple of hours in a higher temperature range to fully render fat and dissolve collagen. Brisket can be done in a range of 200-210°F (93-99°C), but after cooking thousands of briskets, Franklin feels the magic temperature is 203°F (95°C).

Transfer the rendered beef fat to a jar with an airtight lid. It can be stored in the fridge for up to 12 months and can be used to replace butter or anywhere you would use vegetable shortening.

You can eat it, render it down, or simply use pieces of suet to melt on a pan, providing a grass-fed beef flavor ready to pan fry your favorite ingredients in. It can also be added to soups and stews to add depth and flavor.

Health Benefits of Beef Tallow

Rich in nutrients – not only does it help you absorb more nutrients from your food, but beef tallow is also rich in vitamins A, D, E, K, and B1. Reduces inflammation – tallow contains conjugated linoleic acid, which is a natural anti-inflammatory.

Both tallow and lard are healthy, especially if you can get them from pastured (pigs) grass-fed and finished (cows) sources. Pastured lard is rich in vitamin D (something more than half all Americans are lacking), while tallow is rich in a slew of pro-metabolic fatty acids and vitamins.

Tallow is simply beef fat that has been rendered (cooked down) to remove impurities. Rendered beef or sheep fat is called tallow.

How long does beef tallow last? ›

Tallow will solidify and keep at room temperature in a sealed container for up to a year and won't go rancid. Beef Tallow will keep even longer in the refrigerator or indefinitely in the freezer.

Tallow is a rendered form of beef or mutton fat, primarily made up of triglycerides.

You can choose to add it to the wrapper by laying out some aluminum foil, smearing beef tallow over it, and then wrapping it up. Alternatively, you can inject your brisket with the beef tallow to infuse it into the meat. This is one of the best ways to ensure that your brisket won't dry out during cooking.

Turn the burner on medium-low heat. Render the beef fat. Allow the fat to simmer at this low and slow temperature for 4 hours, stirring about every 30 minutes with a wooden spatula. If needed, scrape the spatula along the bottom of the pan to release any stuck on bits of fat or beef to prevent them from burning.

Beef Fat Trimmings: To make beef tallow, you will need 2.5 Pounds of Beef Fat Trimmings. You can ask your Butcher to select the fat trimmings that they have removed from various cuts of beef, for example from a roast. Or, you can use your own leftover trimmings after cooking a roast dinner or a large quantity of meat.

Tallow is rendered beef fat, but just not any beef fat. Beef tallow is rendered from suet. Technically, you can also use the term tallow to describe fat rendered from the suet of other ruminant animals. However, tallow most commonly refers to suet rendered from beef, specifically cattle.

Provides Healthy Fats, Including Cholesterol

As mentioned above, tallow provides both saturated and monounsaturated fats. It's made up of about 40 percent to 50 percent monounsaturated fats, which are considered one of the most heart-healthy fats in our diets. This is the same type of fat found in olive oil.

Fat is flavor, and a small amount lends that burst of juiciness to your brisket slices -- but too much fat would give those slices more of a mushy, slimy mouthfeel. While this is a personal preference, we recommend trimming the fat cap to 1/4 inch with 1/2 inch at the most.

So smoke more meat, not that I need to tell you that if you're reading this site. Connective tissue won't break down completely until the brisket reaches an internal temperature of 200°F.

As a general rule, you can leave about a ¼ inch of fat on the brisket if you don't want to trim it as close as the image shows. Remember that seasoning and smoke will never penetrate much farther than about ¼ inch, so if you want more flavor in your brisket, you are going to have to trim it pretty tight.

How do you make tallow trimmings? ›

Chop all of your brisket fat and trimmings into small pieces or strips. If using a meat grinder, partially freeze the meat/fat prior to grinding. Place all of the trimmings in your Casserole dish and place it in the center of your grill. Cook the fat down for about ½ hour, then stir.

Beef trimmings are pieces of meat remaining after steaks, roasts, and other cuts are removed. Beef trimmings are very often used to make ground beef.

Ghee: Ghee is clarified butter. In simple terms, ghee is just a form of butter that has been simmered and strained out of milk solids and water. Tallow: Tallow is nothing but beef fat. The raw fat present around the kidneys and loins of cattle is known as suet.

Tallow is a great moisturizer and can be used to soothe and moisturize dry skin. It's thick enough to handle the toughest rough patches, but light enough to absorb quickly into the skin. Plus, it's loaded with vitamins A, D, E and K, antioxidants and essential fatty acids not commonly found in modern day skincare.

Beef trimmings are edible. No process can make an inedible product edible. What the process does is separate the lean meat from the fat, which was previously near impossible to accomplish through knife trimming by hand.

Animal fats recovered and processed by renderers are used in some animal feed and pet food, and in chemical industry products including toiletries. These recycled animal fats play a significant role in reducing the demand for palm oil.

Suet and Tallow: Non-Inflammatory With A High Smoke Point.

Beef Suet and the clarified / rendered form, Beef Tallow is healthier and stable alternatives to industrially processed inflammation causing seed and vegetable oils like Canola Oil, Sunflower Oil, Soybean Oil, and Peanut Oil.

The very healthiest beef tallow comes from grass-fed cattle. Grass-fed tallow is higher in healthy saturated fats, omega 3's, stearic acid, and conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) than 'regular' tallow. It also provides other fat-soluble nutrients like: Vitamin A.

Because beef fat is 19% stearic acid, the cholesterol-raising potential of beef is not as great as predicted by its total saturated fatty acid content. However, beef tallow is hypercholesterolemic compared with fats containing less cholesterol-raising saturated fatty acid.

The switch was all because of a man named Phil Sokolof. After having a heart attack in 1966, Sokolof began lobbying against cholesterol and fat in fast food, specifically targeting McDonald's. He eventually got the company's attention, leading the chain to stop cooking its fries in beef tallow in 1990.

Is avocado oil better than beef tallow? ›

Organic, unrefined avocado oil is the healthiest choice to use for cooking. Tallow is a form of rendered animal fat, usually made from beef, although there are also vegetarian versions also available. If you're using beef to make tallow, the healthiest tallow comes from grass-fed beef, not grain-fed beef.

A highly saturated fat like beef tallow isn't as susceptible to useage-decay as, say, soybean oil. As long as it's stored properly in an airtight container—preventing oxidation—beef tallow will be good for many uses before you have to replace it.

No. Our fries are not coated in any fats or substances from an animal.

Crisco®, which is a brand name and part of the Smucker's family of brands, is a vegetable shortening.

The natural makeup of beef tallow promotes health. Beef tallow does not contain the artificial trans fats found in hydrogenated shortenings. It's naturally stable and solid at room temperature. When heated, it does not release free radicals, which have been linked to cancer, as vegetable oils do.

In healthy cattle, yellow fat color occurs when cattle graze green pasture. This results from the ingestion and absorption of yellow pigments that are present in plants. These pigments have been identified as carotenoids, with beta-carotene being the major component responsible for fat color in cattle.

The fat should be a yellow color. If it is starting to turn brown, then the heat may be too high. After the beef has rendered, while it is still hot, carefully pour the tallow through a fine mesh strainer into a container. Not everything will completely melt.

First, refine the animal fat (we are assuming beef tallow) with an alkali, such as caustic soda. Then bleach the material by absorption or treatment with a bleaching earth or carbon. The actual deodorization is achieved by a process called (vacuum steam stripping'.

For the purification, you need to cut up the tallow into large chunks and place it back in a pan over medium to high heat. Add 5 cups of water and 1/4 cup of salt. The salt will pull out any additional impurities. Bring it to a boil and then reduce to a simmer for 10 minutes.

How long does it take to smoke tallow? ›

It doesn't need much time, 30-60 minutes depending on your palate. It's an amazing transformation as long as you don't overdo it. We actually like to smoke the fat before we render it, though if you already have tallow on hand do not let that deter you.

Cook for about 2 hours. Strain through cheese cloth. Store in a jar with a lid in the refrigerator for up to 2 months.

A: No need to refrigerate tallow. If you do, it will become rock hard and difficult to use (You can warm the jar up in a hot water bath). Tallow is naturally shelf stable.

Beef tallow has a distinct, rich flavor that is similar to butter or other animal fats. It adds a depth of beefy flavor to dishes that other vegetable oils and types of fat can't achieve.

Brisket fat trimmings have multiple uses. You can use them to make beef tallow, hamburger meat, homemade sausages, and Yorkshire pudding. You can also use them as meat moisturizer when smoking brisket. So if you have been throwing away brisket fat trimmings, you now know not to do that.

There are two ways to render—with dry heat or wet heat. Dry heat means you are cooking just the fat on its own, whereas wet heat includes a bit of water. You can use a crock pot, stovetop, or oven with either method. The fat is slowly cooked until it melts and is then strained of impurities from the cooking process.

You can render pork fat by simmering it in a pan over low heat until the fat has melted and the liquid has turned clear. You can then strain the fat through a fine mesh strainer, pour it into a glass jar, and refrigerate it until it solidifies.

Cut fat into 1-2 inch portions. Place into a large saucepan or pot and place over low heat for a few hours, stirring occasionally. After the beef has rendered, while it is still hot, carefully strain the tallow through a fine mesh strainer into a container. Allow to cool in the refrigerator.

Making your own beef tallow is a great way to use extra fat trimmings from a brisket or other parts of the cow. The beef tallow makes for a delicious substitute for oil or butter, and it tastes amazing. It's quite easy to make and if you follow along, I'll show you How to Make Beef Tallow in your own kitchen.

Why is my rendered lard not white? ›

Rushing leads to overcooking the fat which leads to less than ideal lard. When properly rendered, the cooled lard will have a snow white appearance. Any brown color means that it was overcooked. Still usable for frying or if you enjoy pork flavor in your baking!

Add fat trimmings to a disposable aluminum sheet pan and place on smoker while brisket is cooking. Depending on size of smoker place beside or on shelf under the brisket. Cook for approximately 4 hours at 250° F, or until fat has rendered into tallow, stirring occasionally to make sure not to burn.

As a solid ingredient that can turn liquid in the heat, if tallow melts, it can separate into fats and liquid. Once cooled, it can then have a grainy, unpleasant texture. To avoid this, keep all tallow-based products out of the heat.

It doesn't need much time, 30-60 minutes depending on your palate. It's an amazing transformation as long as you don't overdo it. We actually like to smoke the fat before we render it, though if you already have tallow on hand do not let that deter you.